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For the White House, the trip is a chance to soothe hurt feelings over a perceived lack of personal attention to a key Islamic U.S. ally in the region at a time when the Saudis are feeling nervous about Iran, developments in Egypt and Bashar Assad remaining in power in Syria.

“He’s going to get an earful, and I’m sure he knows that,” said Robert Jordan, who served as George W. Bush’s ambassador to Saudi Arabia for the two years after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks and now works for former Secretary of State James Baker’s law firm in Dubai. “This has been building over the course of this administration.”

“I think this is a form of relationship management,” said Frederick Wehrey of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace.

Much of the substantive work between the two countries will take place before or after the meeting, Wehrey said. Commerce Secretary Penny Pritzker and Secretary of State John Kerry have been in Saudi Arabia in recent weeks, and other officials will be traveling there soon — depending on the outcome of Obama’s talks.

Part of the problem is that neither the White House nor the Saudis are likely to change their positions on any of the issues where there is tension. “The disagreement is about policy,” said Douglas Feith, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute. “It’s not a misunderstanding, so it’s going to make for a difficult meeting.”

The Obama administration has maintained that the relationship between the two countries is in good shape. CIA Director John Brennan said earlier this month the U.S.-Saudi relationship is “on very, very strong and solid ground,” despite what he said are “anonymous” comments about “tension.”

“There are maybe differences of view, but what we have committed to do is to ensure that we have a very robust and private dialogue about those issues, ranging from Iran to Egypt to Iraq to Syria and others,” Brennan said at the Council on Foreign Relations. “And so I feel as though that relationship right now with Saudi Arabia is on very, very strong and solid ground and we’re able to move together.”

In echoes of his troubles on Capitol Hill, Obama suffers from a diplomacy deficit in the Middle East, and the relationship between the two countries is as fraught as it has ever been, experts say.

A key source of the strain is Iran. Obama has made his outreach to Tehran a central focus of his Middle East policy. Obama spoke by phone last year with Iranian President Hassan Rouhani — the first direct talks between the counterparts since the Iranian revolution. The Saudis, said Craig Unger, author of the book “House of Bush, House of Saud,” worry that any increased Iranian prestige and influence would come at their expense.

“If there is a rapprochement of sorts with Iran, that would mean that potentially the balance of power could shift in the Middle East and the U.S. would be less dependent on Saudi Arabia,” Unger said.